You are here

Home » Blogs » Jonathan's blog

Mental Illness

published by Jonathan on Mon, 04/23/2007 - 20:33

People are using the Va Tech massacre to support their view about gun control: either that there should be more or less restrictions on gun ownership. I think this incident is an anomaly, something that really doesn't have much helpful to say about which direction gun laws should go. The best thing I've heard lately about this story, though, is that he should have be ineligible to purchase a gun because a court had declared him a danger to himself. I don't want to own a gun. I don't have a problem with law-abiding, mentally-stable people having guns as long as they keep them out of the reach of children. If you've got mental problems, though, you've got no business with a gun. From the article by Michael Luo in the NY Times:

Under federal law, the Virginia Tech gunman Seung-Hui Cho should have been prohibited from buying a gun after a Virginia court declared him to be a danger to himself in late 2005 and sent him for psychiatric treatment, a state official and several legal experts said Friday. Federal law prohibits anyone who has been "adjudicated as a mental defective," as well as those who have been involuntarily committed to a mental health facility, from buying a gun. The special justice's order in late 2005 that directed Mr. Cho to seek outpatient treatment and declared him to be mentally ill and an imminent danger to himself fits the federal criteria and should have immediately disqualified him, said Richard J. Bonnie, chairman of the Supreme Court of Virginia's Commission on Mental Health Law Reform. A spokesman for the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives also said that if Mr. Cho had been found mentally defective by a court, he should have been denied the right to purchase a gun.

Now we've got to figure out how to fix the system for background checks. Of course, he could he found illegal ways to get guns, but I think we'd benefit by making it harder for the mentally unstable to get firearms. Knowing what harm mentally ill people can do, we may need to re-calibrate the balance between public safety and privacy rights. Here's an article the describes the difficulties universities have in dealing with the mentally ill: link

Tags: 
Health

Comments

Submitted by Robin (not verified) on Tue, 04/24/2007 - 08:16.

I agree with you that mentally ill people should not be allowed to own a gun. However, in the VT case I don't believe that not been able to get a gun would have prevented tragedy. He was intent on killing and probably would have made a bomb and killed even more people. Bomb making instructions are easily obtainable on the internet. My question was why didn't the classroom doors lock and instead had to be barricaded. Chris says none of the classrooms at U of M are ever locked and professors don't have a key anyway. Being able to lock the classroom doors in this instance would have helped tremendously. Unfortunately, someone with evil intent will find a way to carry out their plans guns or not.

Submitted by Jonathan (not verified) on Tue, 04/24/2007 - 13:35.

At Dow in the last year or two, we've had several "drills" where we practice what would happen if there was a "potentially violent" person on site. In my building, locks were added to any conference room doors that didn't have them as a safety measure for such an event. I think practicing those types of scenarios is helpful. VT clearly had some shortcomings in their procedures.

Submitted by Jonathan (not verified) on Thu, 05/03/2007 - 20:29.

In Steve Chapman's recent column, it mentions that some advocates for the mentally ill are upset about restrictions on their gun ownership:

"It is unconscionable to restrict people's civil rights because they have a medical illness," said Nada Stotland, vice president of the American Psychiatric Association (though APA says it doesn't take a position).David Shern, president of Mental Health America, denounced the measure as "an extremely ill-informed, regressive social policy that further stigmatizes people and will do nothing to reduce gun violence." The critics say the ban discriminates against people with mental illness, based on the erroneous assumption that they are more violent than other people.But it's fair to assume that people who have been evaluated and ruled by a court to be dangerous are indeed more dangerous than those who have not.And it's ridiculous to claim that barring them from getting guns punishes them for having a medical illness.The point, keep in mind, is to exclude anyone who is dangerous, regardless of whether they're sick or well, sane or not. The categories in the law are a reasonable attempt to define the sort of people who should not be trusted with lethal firepower.

Theme by Danetsoft and Danang Probo Sayekti inspired by Maksimer